The Circle (Hammer) - By Elfgren, Sara B.,Strandberg, Mats Page 0,161
linoleum spreads through the room.
Minoo turns towards Max. The black smoke is still coiling around him, dancing, creating patterns in the air, as he moves towards her. It’s like a living organism. It’s almost beautiful. Alluring.
‘Minoo,’ he says, and smiles.
That’s the worst thing. That he seems so happy to see her. As if what he has just done doesn’t matter.
‘I know you don’t understand now,’ he says, ‘but all I want … the only thing I’ve ever wanted … is for us to be together. We belong together.’
Rage fizzes through her blood. ‘But I don’t,’ she says, and is surprised by how strong and confident her voice is.
Max stops short. He looks hurt. The black smoke writhes around him, sending out long feelers that approach Minoo but pull back at the last moment.
Minoo stands her ground. Her body is filled with unfamiliar signals. Something is swirling in the air around her, flowing in front of her, intoxicating her with its power.
‘Minoo,’ Max says weakly. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m letting go.’
The black smoke between them thickens.
But it’s not just coming from Max. It’s streaming out of Minoo, twisting and churning with long black tentacles.
She’s powerful. She’s a whole army. She’s plugged directly into something that is staggeringly more powerful than she is. They are many. They are one. Together they move towards Max.
He looks at her in panic. He can’t move. The smoke envelops him, stops him running away as she approaches, engulfs them both in a swirling black maelstrom.
‘Please, Minoo,’ Max says, dropping to his knees at her feet. ‘I love you.’
The words don’t move her. She knows what she has to do. Minoo lays her hand on his forehead. She shuts her eyes and sees: the demons’ blessing.
Like a shimmering black aura it surrounds Max. The demons’ magic. The black smoke streaming out of Minoo chokes it.
The aura fades. Eventually there’s nothing left. The blessing is broken.
She feels Max’s life force leaving his body, sucked out by her hand, filling her and making her even stronger and more powerful.
Something is stuck inside Max, something that is struggling to make its way to the surface. She helps it pull itself out.
It’s like a weight that suddenly releases.
And Minoo’s eyes fill with tears, because now she feels it so clearly.
Rebecka. She’s been trapped inside Max. But now her soul radiates through Minoo, fills her with light. All that was her is inside Minoo – and then she’s gone. Free at last.
Soon afterwards comes Elias. Minoo recognises him as if she’d known him all her life, and long before that. His soul passes through her and disappears.
Minoo’s fingers grab Max’s forehead, boring themselves into his hair. His body sags and she sinks to her knees beside him as he drops on to his side.
She is filled with him. Impressions, thoughts and feelings, everything that he’s experienced. Everything that is him flows through Minoo, as if picked up by a hitherto unknown sense.
Memories.
Max drags Linnéa from his car across the playground. Her hands and feet are tightly bound, but she tries to resist.
He opens the door to his house to find an unknown girl with a long black fringe standing outside. She pulls out a gun and tells him he’s going to die for what he did to Elias. But he sees in her hesitation that she won’t shoot. She’s no killer. And he knows that she’s a Chosen One. That she’ll help him find the others. What a gift.
He wakes, as if out of a dream, and sees Minoo in front of him in the classroom. They whisper to him that he has exposed himself. They’re angry but he’s afraid. Afraid she’ll misunderstand, that she won’t realise he’ll never harm her again, that they belong to each other.
The barn is burning and the cows are bellowing in panic. He runs away with Their strident voices in his head. They threaten to renege on their promise. They won’t let Minoo live after all.
Minoo asks if he can wait for her. He can wait for ever.
He’s in the classroom looking at Anna-Karin: she’s changed so much during the term. He knows how such things happen. Why didn’t he pick up on it sooner?
Minoo is so beautiful when he sees her by the viaduct. He knows he shouldn’t but he kisses her anyway. He’s made a new pact with Them: they’ll let her live.
The awful moment in the bath when he defied Them for the first time.